Dark social is, forms of social media traffic that cannot be traced such as messaging on Facebook messenger or whatsapp and emailing. These private messaging apps are becoming more popular. 95% of people in Australia use these untraceable means of communication.
So what does this mean for your business?
Well dark social isn’t traceable by analytic programs used to measure social media success which makes it harder to accurately know how much traffic is coming in to your website via private referral. We all know word of mouth and personal recommendations are effective marketing tools. If people are moving away from talking about your brand in public forums you will no longer have access to what their saying.
And if you’re beginning to regret your social media tactics great let that feed your trip to the dark side.. follow me if you dare to learn the 5 reasons I think dark social is beneficial for business.
- it is not completely untraceable HA sucked in consumers… no but really you can track copy and paste type links to your website and these are the most commonly used when something has been shared via dark social. this website states that long or shortened slugs can help you in detecting these types of visits through your analytical software if someone lands on a specific page with quite a large name you can safely assume it was a copy paste link that got them there, I don’t know about you but I wouldn’t be typing kannelise.wordpress.com/political.discussion/australianpolitics but hey I’ll just use the force.. This for business’s means you just have to get savvy with the analytics your using.
- Word of mouth has always been around and you’ve never been able to control it ? realistically that is all this is using private means of communication with other people and its been around for years so it isn’t that scary, especially for business you can get some wonderful boosts if one person has a good experience on the flip side if your customer service is shitty you know 5o of my friends have heard about it.
- Public sharing and social media will not become obsolete, these platforms rise and fall and follow specific trends, keep a social media “expert” on hand at all times to monitor the ebb and flow of the web.
- Even elements of dark social are available to advertisements and products, snap chat recently changed its layout and although messaging and pictures are still private “dark social” there is a public component of stories and the discover section devoted to news, brands such as WWE and Buzzfeed you can still advertise through dark social media.
- You have to get creative, have some fun create something different have a chance to make your brand or product stand out in the sea of products being shoved in consumers faces, it gives you the chance to lead the pack and create something new.
I hope these tips have light the dark fire in your business and you can happily join us on the dark side.
Kannelise 